Furnace Guy and Interior Environments

 Some images of my other character 'Furnace Guy' a stationary furnace, in his room in the factory, including the chess board and pieces  all fully textured and bump mapped.

These images are of the entrance room in the factory, rows of dusty bookshelves creating a darkened corridor leading into the building. lit from the front by the outside moonlight shining through the windows and from behind by a single yellowed light bulb.

Bonus image of the outside again, as I decided to change it slightly since the last post, I placed a statue in the village square and added a sky box  for more dynamic shots of the surroundings and a better sense of scale for the character. The only thing missing in this shot is the rain, but as I have said previously, I plan to add that in After Effects, for quicker rendering.

Texture Model and First Images of Environment

So I finished texturing and adding final touches to my Robot Birdie, including glowing eyes and steam effects. His fingers are now also fully rigged along with his arms and legs, so he's all but ready to animate.

I've also finished the environment for my first couple of scenes, fully texture, bump mapped and lit, the only thing left to add is the rain, but most of that sort of thing will be done in After Effects.

I have one more environment and another character to create after these, then I will be able to start animating.

Robot Birdie Model

Almost finished modeling Robot Birdie, just need to rig the fingers and toes, and texture him up, then onto the environment.

I did make a few changes from the original design, for example, I changed the position of the arm, so that he could more effectively manipulate the chess peices. I also made his body more boxy to create a more mechanical feel and added a furnace in his chest for extra lighting and interest.

Environment Artwork

An idea I had for my external environment.
A deserted, cobblestone, Victorian street on a stormy night.
Light sources: cold blueish light from the moon/sky, Yellowed flickering light from the streetlamps.
Occasionally the whole scene is lit by a flash of lightening.

Steampunk Robot Artwork

Painting I did of how my chess playing robot should hopefully turn out :)
May upload more developmental work at a later date

Character Sketches

Some sketches of possible character designs:

Main Character:

Secondary Character:

A Steampunk Robot Character

My next university project will involve creating a steam punk robot character that will be playing chess, here is my first attempt at drawing and painting a robot:

I tried to make him look as steampunk as possible, mainly through the colour pallet and details like cogs and valves.
This probably wont be the robot I use in my final animation, partly because his proportions would make it difficult to utilize a chess board, but also because he just dost look the chess playing type, more the planetary destruction type.
As I said this is my first attempt at painting a robot at all, since my usual art style is more biological creatures, so bare in mind that it is very rough and I hope to improve my robot drawing skills.

Digital Artwork

Just some digital art I've been working on over the summer etc. let me know what you think ^.^ (Just remember I'm still learning =D)

Interactive 500 Word Self Assessment

I feel that the overall design of my site turned out to be better than I had hoped; using the feedback that friends and family gave me I was able to expand my design and make it more unique. Originally I wanted to create a more colourful site, but seeing the websites that are too noisy and loud put me off that idea, to the point that I even took out the purple, and stuck only with the blue, black and white, keeping the site minimalistic without looking too dull. Another way I achieved this was using a subtle background, keeping it black, but adding a lighter, grey pattern to break up the plain colour and make the page more interesting and feel less empty.

In designing my website I wanted it to be set out in a minimalistic way that was easy to navigate while still being aesthetically pleasing. I think I achieved this because though at first my website went through a lot of changes to things such as colour schemes and fonts; my final design was clear and concise while still being professional and attractive. I think my most successful pages were my gallery pages, because they are well laid out and look very professional.

The audience which this site is aimed at is possible employers or other interested parties looking for examples of my work and skills, for this reason I made the site easy to navigate and very clear and concise, so that these users can find the information they are looking for fast and efficiently without having to mess around looking for links or deciphering jumbles of text and images.

In this project I have learned how to use the Dreamweaver software on a more advanced level. In the last project I did not have to use anything so advanced as a CSS page, so this project was much more complex, and so I had to learn a lot of new techniques and processes for producing things on the page such as paragraphs, break tags how to use headers, footers and DIV boxes, also how to embed images and video in pages using iFrames.I also learned what Adobe Bridge is for and how to use it to create and embed galleries.

There are a few points in which I believe I could have improved on, most of which are related to having a better and more in-depth understanding of the programs I used. I know I could have incorporated the images and the videos into the page better, making them look more in place.

I would also have preferred the background to be more detailed and ornate but time was short and it was complex enough to make it repeatable. Given more time I would have added to the design.

I would also have added more information to the site given more time, as there is not a lot of text. However being a portfolio sit it would naturally have been built up over time.

I may use my new knowledge of to create an proper portfolio website, which would be helpful to me in networking and self promotion. This may help me find employers in the future.

Photoshop Practice

So I decided that while I was off over the holidays I would start learning some Photoshop painting techniques, and I don't think it went too badly:

Its my first attempt at using blending modes to produce the light and shadow, so its a bit untidy and rough, but hopefully with a lot of practice I can get it to look as good as the professional's one day.